There's More Than One of Everything
by The Hearts Of The Tardis
Summary: Post Doomsday. Rose uses the dimension cannon in an attempt to return the the Doctor she knew and loved. While at first glance it appears she has gotten home safely, the universe isn't always as it seems.


Chapter One- Upon Arrival

Rose stretched her shaking limbs one by one, lifting herself from the asphalt. She felt blood trickling down both her knees, adrenaline and confusion desensitizing her feelings of pain.

Loud heart beats echoed through her system as she struggled to recall what exactly was going on. She sensed a wide range of emotions; loss, excitement, relief. In the minutes that followed, she stood, her eyes wide and her mind racing.

The Doctor. The Daleks. Pete's World. Torchwood. The Dimension Cannon. To be honest, two skinned knees was almost a lame price to pay for inter-dimensional space travel.

Her mouth was agape below widened eyes dusted with a layer of saltwater. Pinkened lips were breaking into a foolish grin across her face. She stared, unwavering at the zeppelin less sky that she thought during many sleepless nights she would never see again. Her gaze then shifted to the double decker bus hurtling down the city street, and her ears reveled in the noisy din of careless chatter. Laughter bubbled uncontrollably through her at how giddy she felt. Never in a million years had she imagined she would be this elated to stand on a crowded London street, but as of now, she was shaking with uncontrollable euphoria.

Finally, she was home.

Rose knew her journey was far from over. She still had the heavy task of finding a Doctor that would coincide with her timeline. Tracking down the TARDIS was not a mundane activity, and Rose's only flicker of hope was that the TARDIS would somehow sense her presence in this universe and lead the Doctor here. Crazier things had happened.

Rose's only possession, excluding the clothes on her person, was the heavy backpack slung over her shoulders. In Pete's World, she had filled it with various expensive pieces of discarded jewelry, as she doubted currency would be exchangeable between the two universes.

"So, first order of business- find a pawn shop," Rose said to herself, mostly to make sure her vocal chords still functioned. She set off down the road, her thick dark boots slapping the pavement with enthusiasm. Her pace was slow, due to fatigue and the desire to fully take in her surroundings.

After a leisurely walk, and many awkward instances of asking for directions, Rose finally found herself on a mostly abandoned street corner, in front a small hole-in-the-wall sort of place. It was the exact sort of store front you would expect at a place that hopefully, would not question why a twenty something year old woman had a backpack full of expensive jewelry.

Rose left the shop with a few thousand dollars in cash, and jewelry to spare. It was deep into the evening now, and Rose yearned to see through the light pollution from street lamps and at her beloved starry sky.

She spotted a hotel that looked pretty reasonable, or at least good enough to spend the night before she found somewhere better. She ambled inside the plexiglass glass doors quickly, nearly blinded by the fluorescent lights above her.

"Good Evening Miss," the receptionist greeted her, and Rose offered her a kind but distant smile.

"G'evening. I'm gonna need a room for tonight. For just me, do you have the space?"

"Of course Miss...?" The woman trailed off.

"Smith," Rose said, without thinking. She had told herself that using the alias was important precaution due to her being reported dead in this universe. Despite that, part of her wondered if subconsciously, she only fancied using it because it made her feel like she was traveling with the Doctor again.

Once the logistics had been sorted out, Rose found herself on a generously pillowed queen size bed, located in an average sized hotel room. Her head hit the pillow graciously as her entire body collapsed onto the bed, running out of enough energy to even stand. Tired muscles in her back immediately cringed as the metal in her backpack poked uncomfortably into her spine.

Every single part of her ached as she sat up, removing the bag from her shoulders. One by one she dumped the contents onto the mattress, to check if everything was still in order.

The money she'd gotten from the pawn shop and the jewelry glistened on the bed hungrily, only serving to remind Rose that she depended on them. It felt to her that their only purpose was in taunting her. If she was with the Doctor, no money would be needed. Her heart was aching with every beat, and her throat became noticeably dry. She shoved those items back in the bag.

The next item brought to her attention failed to ease her mood whatsoever. She felt hollow as her eyes became fixated on the silver and black handgun sitting threateningly on the duvet. Her gun from Torchwood; the scariest thing about it not the guilty lives she had taken, but the fact that she couldn't bear the thought of not bringing it along.

Over and over, she had pretended for her own mind's sake that bringing the gun with her was meant to keep her from forgetting the lives she had taken. While partially true, Rose knew that life without the Doctor for three years had left her battered, stronger, but different.

Was she too different though? When Rose had left her universe the first time, she had been nearly certain that the Doctor felt the same way about her as she did to him. As time went on though, and her vivid memories of Dalek attacks and holding his hand began to fade, and doubt snuck into her system. All it took then was time, time and the Doctor's inability to tell her he loved her on Bad Wolf bay, and by the end of her first year in Pete's World, Rose was practically certain she had had fabricated the whole romance in her stupid ape mind.

While that realization had been crushing at first, and her mother refused to let up the fantasy that the Doctor had been infatuated with Rose as well, Rose grew to accept it. The prospect of reciprocated love failed to hinder her desire to return to her best mate, and she had worked at developing the dimension cannon harder than ever. Although she had given up the idea that the Doctor felt the same way about her, she couldn't bear to give up the idea that he wanted her to return.

Working for Torchwood though, a place full of dangerous monsters with daily death threats, it had changed her. She began carrying a gun, and she began giving orders. She only had one photo of her and the Doctor. It was taken on Christmas, all those years ago after he regenerated. They were standing under the ashen sky and smiling, her head resting on his shoulder. Rose was terrified to admit that she barely recognized the girl in the photo.

Her trembling hand lifted the weapon carefully into the backpack and out of sight. A deep breath of relief ran from the base of her lungs, through her heart and into the seemingly colder air surrounding her.

She wrapped the duvet around her, trying in vain desperation to feel comfortable. She had felt like a stranger in Pete's World and she felt like a stranger in her home world. She missed Jackie, Pete, and Tony, and just picturing her mother's face was absolute agony.

What if she never found the Doctor? What if she lived out the rest of her days in this universe, alone and afraid, just searching and searching.

Even though her TARDIS key had been reduced to just cold metal, and lacked its other-worldly warmness and golden glow Rose had hoped it would posses upon arrival, it was still beyond comforting. She held it to her chest and shut her eyes and let sleep encompass her.

She had so much to do, but all of it could wait until tomorrow.

* * *

Only a few blocks away from the hotel Rose was sleeping at, a dimly lit street corner harbored an eerie glow, and the sound of keys scratching across piano strings rung freely. A blue police telephone box faded into no one in particular's view.

Inside the police box was a two hearted man, grinning foolishly, a large leather jacket slung around an olive green shirt. His eyes were gazing deeply into equally amused hazel ones over the console of the TARDIS.

"Am I interrupting TARDIS console sex?" A voice boomed from over them. The two's stare broke as they turned to see the suggestive smile of Captain Jack Harkness, his eyes widening purposefully. "Care if I join?"

He approached Rose who whacked his arm playfully. "You're such a loser," she declared, biting back a smile. "You need a good shag. Can we go to another 61st century club Doctor?"

"Never again," the Doctor said, shaking his head and glaring at Jack.

Jack raised his palms upwards. "I didn't know one shot of hyper-vodka was enough to trash you Doctor,"

"Yeah, sure you didn't," Rose said. "Where are we Doctor?"

"Uh-" he glanced down at the console. "Your time. Early Twenty first century. That's weird, I didn't set those coordinates."

"Well it wouldn't be the first time you brought me home by mistake," Rose's voice had a hint of bitterness to it. The Doctor averted her gaze. "Sorry," she added.

He shrugged and allowed hand to pace with hers, and ran his thumb over her knuckles gently.

"What day is it?" Jack wondered, looking over the Doctor's shoulder to read the coordinates.

"It's-" the Doctor faltered. "Rose look, a year ago this day we started traveling together."

"How cute," Jack said mockingly.

"Really? Like in actual time or just outside? It feels like a lot longer than a year..."

"Feels it, yeah. But traveling through time messes with perception. Maybe The TARDIS took us here to celebrate."

"Or maybe," Jack said, with a raised eyebrow, "there's an alien invasion that needs stopping!"

"Either way," Rose began, gesturing towards the door. "Wanna take look?" Her voice still had the same eager tone it had at every new landing, and the Doctor wondered if she would ever habituate to the traveling.

They stepped from the box into the cool evening air, the light hair on Rose's arms prickling upward in the light breeze. She shoved her arms through the holes of her sweatshirt before lacing her hand through the Doctors.

"Even if it's my home planet, stepping out of that box never gets old," Rose mused, throwing a smile the Doctor's way. He looked back with crinkled blue eyes.

"It never does," he agreed.

"Should we visit my mum? It's a bit late and she might be out for the night."

"Or worse, have someone over," Jack added.

"Well yeah," Rose said. "I vote we take Jack out for drinks, to be totally honest with you I think he needs it."

"You're just hoping the Doctor will get drunk so he lets me join you guys."

"You better not be," the Doctor said tersely. Rose rolled her eyes.

"Not unless you were into the idea," she purred into the Doctor's ear and pressed a kiss to his cheek. His smile was radiant.

The group of three had settled into a slow pace down the sidewalk, heading nowhere in particular, when a loud boom echoed across the sky. The Earth shook beneath their feet and all three of their faces broke out into ridiculous grins. A spaceship came hurling into view, smashing right into Big Ben.

"Well there's our alien invasion," Jack said. The other two beamed, familiar adrenaline picking up its pace through their veins.

* * *

The crash woke our Rose up immediately, the flimsy hotel bed trembling underneath her. As soon as she fully regained consciousness, her stomach lurched in fear, wondering if London was experiencing some sort of earthquake. Earthquakes were a common side effect when you ripped a hole in the universe, and using a highly experiential dimension cannon was a recipe for doing so.

She grabbed her backpack, deciding the best thing to do was attempt to get out of the building, then figure out what was going on. Her black boots made soft thuds as she tumbled through the carpeted hallways, down the stairs. and out into the evening air. The roads were lit gorgeously by street lamps, and she noted that her parallel world had smelled ever so slightly more like iron.

Rose began walking around the newly found world, exhilaration having awoken her with no return now. She examined every previously out of place building with precision, and smiled wistfully.

The ground was still trembling slightly, but from the exhaust smell in the air, Rose decided that this had to be some sort of space ship causing the disturbance. Her spirits lifted instantly, for; where there were spaceships, there was the Doctor.

She was about to turn around and head back to her hotel when, for no reason in particular, she lifted her head a fraction of an inch. Her jaw dropped immediately, and her heart beat was seemingly audible from a fifty mile radius.

In Rose's line of vision, was a big blue police box.


End file.
